hoping to get some advice here. I am a new employee at a corporate office that does icebreaker games in meetings so we can “get to know each other”.
In one of these games, employees are chosen to share about their life, usually people share about their family/ where they grew up and share interesting stories about their life. This feels really personal to me; I have never had a job that requires this. Usually icebreaker games I’ve played are about what food you like, etc. Also, my home life and childhood was not good, usually people show their picture-perfect lives and have beautiful stories. I am scared to be chosen, because what would I have to share? I don’t want to share my life with my coworkers, they are not my friends.
Is there a polite way to refuse this if I am chosen? I am a people pleaser so I guess I don’t want to look rude if I say I am not comfortable with this. However, I am also a very private person, and like to keep to myself. I have bad anxiety around opening up to people, so this feels very vulnerable to me.
TLDR: my work does “icebreaker” activities where we share about our lives, but I don’t want to open up to my coworkers in this way because they don’t need to know my story and my personal life. Is this unreasonable? Do other jobs do this?